A user call operation profile (user profile), contains information pertinent to a telephone call which is specific to a user, such as the identity of a preferred network carrier, speed call information, class of service allowed, and/or other custom calling features. Antiquated equipment could not provide services using user profiles, and therefore to provide such services the antiquated equipment has been required to be replaced with modern equipment which stores such profiles. However even if user profiles are stored, they designate a particular piece of station apparatus (hereinbelow referred to as a telephone set), which is designated by a telephone number.
If a user wishes to temporarily or permanently move to a different physical location and use a different telephone set, either he has been restricted to using the profile associated with that telephone set, or the entire user profile for the different telephone set must be reprogrammed.
Another alternative to offer custom calling features to a remote telephone is to use a Centrex service, in which remote lines are connected directly to a Centrex central switching system. However this creates additional problems and cost, since there may be a significant number of calls desired between users at a remote location, and all such calls must be routed through the Centrex system. Thus a considerable number of Centrex lines must be used, whereas practically they may not all be needed to handle the traffic. Thus it is impossible to obtain the advantages of line concentration. In addition, portability of user profiles can be effected only with reprogramming for each telephone set.